Ry Cooder

Whether serving as a session musician, solo artist, or soundtrack
composer, Ry Cooder's chameleon-like fretted instrument virtuosity,
songwriting, and choice of material encompass an incredibly
eclectic range of North American musical styles, including rock
& roll, blues, reggae, Tex-Mex, Hawaiian, Dixieland jazz,
country, folk, R&B, gospel, and vaudeville. In addition to his
American music bona fides, Cooder is an unofficial American
cultural ambassador: He was partially responsible for bringing
together the Cuban musicians known globally as the Buena Vista
Social Club, recording with Ali Farka Toure, Vishwa Mohan Bhatt,
and Manuel Galban, to name scant few. During the '80s and '90s he
was a celebrated film composer, scoring works such as Walter Hill's
The Long Riders, Wim Wenders' Paris, Texas and The End of Violence,
and Tony Richardson's The Border. Since 1989, he has won six Grammy
Awards and been nominated for many more in genres ranging from
children's music and folk, to Latin (pop and traditional),
Americana, and world music. Among his most notable albums in the
21st century were the conceptual albums Chavez Ravine, about an LA
neighborhood bulldozed to make way for bringing the Dodgers
baseball team to Los Angeles, and San Patricio with the Chieftains,
about a band of immigrant Irish soldiers that deserted the American
Army during the Mexican-American War to fight for the other side.
The 16-year-old Cooder began his career in 1963 in a blues band
with Jackie DeShannon and then formed the short-lived Rising Sons
in 1965 with Taj Mahal and Spirit drummer Ed Cassidy. Cooder met
producer Terry Melcher through the Rising Sons and was invited to
perform at several sessions with Paul Revere & the Raiders.
During his subsequent career as a session musician, Cooder's
trademark slide guitar work graced the recordings of such artists
as Captain Beefheart (Safe as Milk), Randy Newman, Little Feat, Van
Dyke Parks, the Rolling Stones (Let It Bleed, Sticky Fingers), Taj
Mahal, and Gordon Lightfoot. He also appeared on the soundtracks of
Candy and Performance. Cooder made his debut as a solo artist in
1970 with a self-titled album featuring songs by Leadbelly, Blind
Willie Johnson, Sleepy John Estes, and Woody Guthrie. The
follow-up, Into the Purple Valley, introduced longtime cohorts Jim
Keltner on drums and Jim Dickinson on bass, and it and Boomer's
Story largely repeated and refined the syncopated style and mood of
the first. In 1974, Cooder produced what is generally regarded as
his best album, Paradise and Lunch, and its follow-up, Chicken Skin
Music, showcased a potent blend of Tex-Mex, Hawaiian, gospel, and
soul, and featured contributions from Flaco Jimenez and Gabby
Pahinui. In 1979, Bop til You Drop was the first major-label album
to be recorded digitally. In the early '80s, Cooder began to
augment his solo output with soundtrack work on such films as Blue
Collar, The Long Riders, and The Border; he has gone on to compose
music for films such as Paris, Texas, Streets of Fire, Alamo Bay,
Blue City, Crossroads, Cocktail, Johnny Handsome, and Steel
Magnolias, among others. Music by Ry Cooder (1995) compiled two
discs' worth of highlights from Cooder's film work. In 1992, Cooder
joined Keltner, John Hiatt, and renowned British tunesmith Nick
Lowe, all of whom had played on Hiatt's Bring the Family, to form
Little Village, which toured and recorded one album. Cooder turned
his attention to world music, recording the album A Meeting by the
River with Indian musician V.M. Bhatt. Cooder's next project, a
duet album with renowned African guitarist Ali Farka Touré titled
Talking Timbuktu, won the 1994 Grammy for Best World Music
Recording. His next world crossover would become one of the most
popular musical rediscoveries of the 20th century. In 1997, Cooder
traveled to Cuba to produce and play with a group of son musicians
who had little exposure outside of their homeland. The resulting
album, Buena Vista Social Club, was a platinum-selling
international success that made stars of Compay Segundo, Ibrahim
Ferrer, and Rubén González, and earned Cooder another Grammy. He
continued to work on projects with his Buena Vista bandmates,
including a collaboration with Manuel Galbán in 2003 titled Mambo
Sinuendo. His other work in the 2000s included sessions with James
Taylor, Aaron Neville, Warren Zevon, and Spanish diva Luz Casal. In
2005, Cooder released Chavez Ravine, his first solo album since
1987's Get Rhythm; the album was the first entry in a trilogy of
recordings about the disappearance of Los Angeles' cultural history
as a result of gentrification. Chavez Ravine was followed by My
Name Is Buddy in 2007, and the final chapter in the saga I,
Flathead in 2009. In 2010, Cooder was approached by Paddy Moloney
of the Chieftains to produce an album. Moloney had been obsessed
with an historical account of the San Patricios, a band of
immigrant Irish soldiers who deserted the American Army during the
Mexican-American War in 1846 to fight for the other side, against
the Manifest Destiny ideology of James Polk's America. Cooder
agreed and the result was San Patricio, which brings this
fascinatingly complex tale to life. In early 2011, Cooder was taken
by a headline about bankers and other moneyed citizens who'd
actually profited from the bank bailouts and resulting mortgage and
economic crisis, and wrote the song "No Banker Left Behind," which
became the first song on 2011's Pull Up Some Dust and Sit Down, an
album that reached all the way back to his earliest recordings for
musical inspiration while telling topical stories about corruption
-- political and social -- the erasure and the rewriting of
American history, and an emerging class war. A month after its
release, Beat poet Lawrence Ferlinghetti's fabled City Lights
publishing house issued Cooder's first collection of short fiction
entitled Los Angeles Stories. He continued to follow his
socio-political muse with Election Special, released in the summer
of 2012, and in 2013 released Live in San Francisco, his first live
album in 35 years, with Corridos Famosos (son Joachim on
percussion, Flaco Jimenez on accordion, Robert Francis on bass, and
vocalists Terry Evans, Arnold McCuller, and Juliette Commagere).
The ten-piece Mexican brass band La Banda Juvenil also guested. In
2014, Rhino Records offered an epic-scale look at Cooder's work in
film scoring with Soundtracks, a seven-disc box set compiled from
his movie music of the '80s and '90s. After playing mainly
bluegrass and country gospel songs with Ricky Skaggs in 2017,
Cooder's percussionist son Joachim convinced his dad to cut an
album of country and blues-gospel songs. The younger Cooder
arranged the 11-song set and the guitarist fleshed them out for a
band. Entitled The Prodigal Son, it comprising eight covers
including songs by the Pilgrim Travelers, Blind Willie Johnson,
Carter Stanley, and three originals. In late March, Cooder released
a preview video of an arrangement of the title track recorded live
in studio. The Prodigal Son was issued in May 2018 and followed by
his first American tour in 15 years; he was backed by his own band
(with Joachim on drums and percussion) with backing vocals by the
Hamiltones. ~ Steve Huey